Hello!

Sooooo, Im in Malawi now! Yay! Although my camera has broken for the moment so thats a bit gay in my opinion! but have no fear i shall steal photos from other people whether they like it or not - i shall have lasting memories damn it! Where did i last leave it? Ah yes, Chipata. Quite a relaxing night that one, just because no one wanted to do anything because there had been soooo much rain - its actually pretty hard work putting up a tent when its soaking wet - V. heavy! And obviously because of the rain and everything being wet - there were issues making fire for dinner...but dont worry young children Team Man was on the case! That is to say the 5 guys who's turn it was to help cook dinner! and I might add that they took a good hour at least to make fire...something EVERY girl found hilarious as we all sat and watched as they fanned in vain! Dinner however, eventually, was beautiful - i love how we manage to make something out of nothing basically every night - its like blue peter i swear!

Next morning we crossed the border into Malawi, which was fine as always, except that we had to exchange money at the border and so were basically mobbed by locals - NOT a nice experience! Infact, i might even go as far as saying it was quite intense! Wimpy was to the rescue however and sorted it all out for us...well i didnt really give him a choice - i handed him the calculater and the money and had a very scared look on my face that he just couldnt resist helping...the damsel in distress thing does come in handy sometimes i must admit :P

After that ordeal we stopped off in a little market town were the kids were just begging for us to take photos of them - quite sweet really, and there was this really surreal moment where i was walking through the market and suddenly i could hear boys 2 men playing in one of the shops?! TIA (This is Africa) - thats all i can say!

The camp was a pretty nice one actually - swimming pool was a joy as always, especially since the sun was out that afternoon - something we ALL took advantage off as soon as the tents were up! After that the afternoon was, on my part anyway, spent lazing around listening to music, and possibly falling asleep for a while...as you can see i am making full use of the time here! No, it was nice actually, quite relaxing considering we have been getting up at 5am everyday - if not earlier! That night however...was just hilarious! After dinner me, Kav and Louise went to the bar briefly and then to bed...but...after a while me and Kav decided to go back to the bar for a drink seeing as we could hear people were still up, so we walk in and we see Wimpy almost collapsed at the bar (what a good tour guide he is) Kathy and Lisa giggling histerically and Andrew and Steve (two of the Canadian guys) absolutly ratted out of their heads falling all over the place! In fact, i think it is very important to go into more detail regarding steve;s behaviour that night...I was sitting innocently on the sofa with my arms stretched behind my head and steve comes up to me, says in this very seductive tone 'that looks really inviting'...(confused? yes? please continue)...and then proceeds to ARMPIT PUNCH ME!! HARD!!! apparently the sheer site of my armpits was too much for him to resist! Thing is though I can never be mad at Steve, he is just too nice and too damn funny so i had to laugh at it! And obviously I took the piss out of him big time the next morning!

Speaking of which, that brings us to today. Funnily enough Steve and Andrew were one of the last ones ready today...cant imagine why...! It was a REALLY long drive today - wasnt meant to be but because of ALL the rain all the bridges we needed to cross had washed away! we kept having to turn around and go back and find a different route! I think in the end we did 3 sides of the square instead of one (if you can imagine) or in easier terms, instead of 6 hours drive it was 11 and a half! So we arrived at Kandi beach slightly later than planned, but it didnt matter because Kandi beach is amazing! Its basically this beautiful beach on the edge of lake Malawi with a bar, sheltered area for tents, shop, everything you could want! Which obviously meant straight after dinner we HAD to sample the local delights of the bar - which in this case was brilliant because the local beer (which up till now had been called things like 'Serengeti' and 'Taskar') was called Kuchi Kuchi! Brilliant! I just cant imagine any other time when you would find a group of burley men asking the bar tender (also a burley man) for some kuchi kuchi! But yes, so tonight the bar was our friend....and thats all I have to say about that...

p.s. tomorrow night is fancy dress party with hog roast! good times ahead i feel...

xxx